2021-04-15
ศัพท์ น่าสับสน ชุด – A – agnostic & atheist
แนะนำการใช้ ตามที่ส่วนใหญ่ใช้ แต่ละท้องถิ่น
ความหมาย อาจผันแปร ตาม ตำแหน่ง/หน้าที่ ในประโยค
Dictionary.com
ออกเสียง agnostic = ‘ag-NOS-tik’
ออกเสียง atheist = ‘EY-thee-ist’
Dictionary.com
SYNONYM STUDY FOR AGNOSTIC
Agnostic, atheist, infidel, skeptic
refer to persons not inclined toward religious belief
or a particular form of religious belief.
An agnostic is one who believes
it impossible to know anything about God
or about the creationof the universe
and refrains from commitment to any religious doctrine.
An atheist is one who denies the existence of a deity
or of divine beings.
Infidel means an unbeliever, especially a nonbeliever in Islam or Christianity.
A skeptic doubtsand is critical of all accepted doctrines and creeds.
Dictionary.com
HISTORICALUSAGE OF AGNOSTIC
The word agnostic was coined by the English biologist T.H. Huxley in 1869 as a member of the now defunct Metaphysical Society,
in response to
what he perceived as an abundance there of strongly held beliefs.
The original usage of the term was confinedto philosophy and religion,
and referred to Huxley's assertion
that anything beyond the material world,
includingthe existence and nature of God, was unknowable.
Today the word can be seen applied to
questions of politics, culture, and science,
as when someone claimsto be a “political agnostic.”
In a more recent trend,
one can be agnostic simply by not taking a stand on something.
In 2010, President Obama called himself “agnostic” on tax cuts
until he had seen all available options.
At a forum on sustainable energy in 2008,
GE CEO Jeff Immelt said he was “fuel agnostic fundamentally.”
In technology, software or hardware can be said to be agnostic as well.
Computer codethat can run on any operating system is called “platform agnostic,”
and such servicesas phone and electric may be considered “agnostic”
if not dedicated to a particular carrier, device, or user interface.
Dictionary.com
What’s The Difference Between Atheism And Agnosticism?
Studies have found that both
atheists and agnostics are surprisingly knowledgable
about a variety of religions.
Which begs the commonly asked question:
what is the difference between someone
who defines themselves as “atheist”and a professed “agnostic?”
Atheist vs. agnostic
There is a key distinction.
An atheist doesn’t believe in a god or divine being.
The word originates with the Greek atheos, which is built from the roots a- (“without”) and theos (“a god”).
Atheism is the doctrine or belief that there is no god.
However,
an agnostic neitherbelieves nor disbelieves in a god or religious doctrine.
Agnostics assert that
it’s impossible for human beings to know anything
about how the universe was created
and whether or not divine beings exist.
Agnosticism was coined by biologist T.H. Huxley
and comes from the Greek ágnōstos,
which means “unknown or unknowable.”
For example:
- While I now consider myself an atheist, I did attend church regularly as a child.
- If you’re not certain that god exists, you could describe yourself as agnostic.
- Given that the director is an outspoken atheist, it didn’t surprise us that the film was so critical of organized religion.
Theist vs. deist
To complicate matters,
atheists and agnostics are often confused with theists and deists.
A theist is the opposite of an atheist.
Theistsbelieve in the existence of a god or gods.
Like a theist, a deist believes in God.
Buta deist believes that while God created the universe,
natural laws determine how the universeplays out.
Deists are often connected to Isaac Newton’s clockwork universe theory, which compares the universe to a clock that has been wound up
and set in motion by God
but is governedby the laws of science.
For example:
- As an atheist, Edgar has endured quite a few heated arguments with theists who want to win him over to their point of view.
- Many scholars have described Thomas Jefferson as a deist
because he rejected certain aspects of Christianity,
such as miraclesand resurrection,
buthe most certainly believed in God.
Dictionary.com
ABOUT THIS WORD
What does atheist mean?
An atheistis a person
who does not believe in the existence of a supreme being or deity.
In other words, an atheist is a person who does not believe in the existence of God or of any gods.
The belief ordoctrine
that denies the existence of gods orsupreme beings is atheism.
Atheist can also be used as an adjective
to describe such beliefs or things involving such beliefs.
The adjective atheisticcan be used in the same way.
The word atheist means something different from the word agnostic, which refers to a person who believes it is impossible to know whether or not a supreme being exists.
When askedif God or gods exist, an atheist would answer “No,”
while an agnostic would answer “It is impossible to know.”
Example: Being an atheist doesn’t mean I think God is bad
—it means that I think God doesn’t exist.
Where does atheist come from?
The first records of the word atheist come from around 1570.
It comes from the Greek áthe(os), meaning “godless.”
In atheist, the beginning part a- means “without”
and the main root is based on a word meaning“god”
(the words theology and theist are based on the same root).
The noun suffix -ist indicates a personwho holds certain beliefs.
Historically, being known as an atheist has been dangerous
—many atheists have even been torturedor killed,
such as in societies that require adherence to a specific religion.
Even today, many atheists face discrimination.
Many support policies
that ensure that religious freedom
applies even to those who do not follow any faith.
Merriam-Webster Dictionary
How Agnostic Differs From Atheist
Noun
Many people are interested in distinguishing
between the words agnostic and atheist.
The difference is quite simple:
atheist refers to someone
who does not believe in the existence of a god or any gods,
and agnostic refers to someone
who doesn’t know whether there is a god, or even if such a thing is knowable.
This distinctioncan be troublesome to remember,
but examining the origins of the two words can help.
Agnostic first appeared in 1869,
(possibly coined by the English biologist Thomas Henry Huxley),
and was formed from the Greek agnōstos
(meaning "unknown, unknowable").
Atheist came to English from the French athéisme.
Although both words share a prefix
(which is probably the source of much of the confusion)
the main body of each word is quite different.
Agnostic shares part of its history
with words such as prognosticate and prognosis,
words which have something to do with knowledge or knowingsomething.
Atheist shares roots with words such as theology and theism,
which generally have something to do with God.
Merriam-Webster Dictionary
Words at Play
Secular, Atheist, and Agnostic
More Americansare identifying with these than any religion
A study by the Pew Research Center found that
fewer Americansidentify as "Christian"
and that the number of people
who claimto belong to no organized religion has increased.
According to the study,
"as the ranks of the religiously unaffiliated continue to grow,
they also describe themselves in increasingly secular terms,"
including"atheists," "agnostics," or "nothing in particular."
Secular means
"of or relating to the physical world
and not the spiritual world" or "not religious."
It comes from the Latin word
that evolved from meaning "generation" or "age"
to meaning"century" (taken as the extreme limit of a human lifetime).
From this notion of a period of time or "the present time,"
it evolved to mean "the present world,"
as opposed to the seclusion of monastic religious life,
in order to identify clergy whoworked in churches among the people.
From there, it was only a step to today's meaning of "not religious."
Secular came to English from Latin through French;
in modern French the word siècle means "century."
are words that are often used together
or cited in similar contexts,
they do not mean the same thing.
Agnostic comes from the Greek word
meaning "unknown" or "unknowable"
(a-, "not" or "without," and gnōstos, meaning "known").
It means
"a person who does not have
a definite belief about whether God exists ornot"
or, more broadly,
"a person who does not believe or is unsure of something."
Atheist also comes from Greek,
from a- meaning "not" or "without" and theos, meaning "god."
In English is simply means
"a person who believes that God does not exist."
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language,
ag·nos′ti·cal·ly adv.
Word History:
Agnostics do not deny the existence of God
instead, they hold that one cannot know for certain
whether or not God exists.
The term agnostic was coined by the 19th-century British scientist Thomas H. Huxley,
who believed that only material phenomena
were objects of exact knowledge.
He made up the word from the prefix a-, meaning "without, not,"
as in amoral, and the noun Gnostic.
Gnostic is related to the Greek word gnōsis, "knowledge,"
which was used by early Christian writers
to mean "higher, esoteric knowledge of spiritual things";
hence, Gnostic referred to those with such knowledge.
In coining the term agnostic,
Huxley was considering as "Gnostics" a group of his fellow intellectuals
—"ists," as he called them
who had eagerly embraced various doctrines
or theories that explained the world to their satisfaction.
Because he was a "man without a rag of a label to cover himself with,"
Huxley coined the term agnostic for himself,
its first published use being in 1870.
Dictionary of Problem Words in English
agnostic & atheist
An agnostic disclaims any knowledge of God;
an atheist denies the existence of God.
That is, an agnostic says “I don’t know whether there is a God”;
the atheist says “There is no God.”
An agnostic does not deny the existence of deity
but claims that he does not know and that no one else can either.
An atheist believes that God does not now exist
and that He never has existed.
Related terms are disbeliever, doubter, freethinker, unbeliever.
